We recognize environmental issues as a corporate priority Francesco Nalini, CAREL Group CEO

Our mission of high efficiency solutions summarises the model that CAREL has adopted, both the starting point and the final objective that enclose the entire process, from conception to production and marketing of our systems.

Continual improvement is our modus operandi, the process that allows us to achieve a certain standard without this ever representing a limit, rather progressively exceeding it and subsequently defining another at a higher level.

Research, innovation and technology are the keys to our success: for more than forty years, customer needs have been the at the centre of our design work, so as to offer elements of differentiation in terms of both functions and appearance.

The Group's strength lies in integration between different contexts; its overall vision, wide-ranging experience and skills allow us to go beyond the boundaries of individual products and represent a single partner capable of identifying integrated solutions.

Innovation as a business model

Research & Development are the heart of our commitment. A total of 7% of consolidated sales is reinvested in Research & Development, in order to anticipate customer needs and supply advanced solutions. A further 3% of sales is regularly invested in production process technology, so as to ensure ongoing improvement and growth. CAREL also operates two research laboratories, one focused on thermodynamics and the other on humidification, true points of excellence in their respective fields.

Out of the Group's more than 1,350 staff, 18% are employed in Research & Development, a number that reaches almost 25% when considering the designers and technical personnel working at our Italian headquarters. Moreover, 55% of all our employees are university graduates, with an average age of 37, confirming our continuous investments in human resources, above all young people, going against the norm both nationally and internationally.

Training is another area where we devote significant resources (17,000 hours in 2017), applied to all areas of the company with the aim of developing our personnel, both in terms of soft skills and technical competencies.

Endless reliability

Our responsibility towards our customers goes well beyond the value of our sales. The products we develop are in fact components that account for approximately 2 to 10% of the value of our customers' finished products, depending on the application

Moreover, being components that are difficult to source elsewhere, we have adopted a disaster recovery system that involves at least two production sites for the majority of our products. This means we can guarantee the supply of our components even in extreme situations.

The taste of natural growth

Founded in 1973, CAREL in 2017 has consolidated sales of 255,4 million euros (10,6% more than in 2016). Around 80% of sales are from exports, through an extensive sales and customer support network. Specifically, we have operations in the Americas (North, Central and South), Asia Pacific, Africa and Europe; we have 22 fully-owned subsidiaries and 7 production sites, in addition to partners and distributors in a further 75 countries.

We serve more than 4,000 customers, with 6,200 active products and annual production of more than 7 million units.